Regency Rumours/A Scandalous Mistress/Dishonour And Desire Read Free Page A

and disappointment like a pain as she heard their mocking voices again. She watched them linger outside to examine her new coffee-coloured barouche with its cream-and-brownstriped upholstery, its Italian lamps, the dapple-grey horses, the eight-caped coachman and liveried footman in brown and pale grey as neat as could be. They would not find any cattle to beat that showy pair, she thought, turning away with a frown. It had all ended on a very sour note, for she had liked their manner until then. She would find it even more difficult to fulfil her promise now she had seen the kind of men she had agreed to oblige. ‘Caterina dear, have you seen anything suitable?’ she said.
    Wallowing almost knee-deep in expensive metalware, her niece had suddenly become animated and was eyeing a pair of very pretty silver chinoiserie cake-baskets that Amelie would not have minded owning.
    ‘Mm … m,’ Amelie said. ‘Pretty, but …’
    ‘Well, then, what about a large salver? They’re always useful. One cannot have too many salvers, can one?’
    The catalyst was the word ‘useful’. If there was anything a woman disliked being given for her birthday, it came into the ‘useful’ category unless, of course, she had asked for it. Like a carriage and a pair of horses. Eagerly, she looked around for the largest, the most tasteless and most expensive ‘useful’ item on display, though it was Caterina who spotted it first, a massive silver and gilt tea urn with three busty sphinxes holding up the bowl on their wings and a tap that swung away like a cobra about to strike. Standing on an ugly triangular base, it was a monstrous reminder of Lord Nelson’s recent victory in Egypt.
    ‘What if she doesn’t drink tea, though?’ whispered Caterina, without knowing how she and her aunt were working at cross-purposes. ‘It looks
very
expensive.’
    All the better.
‘Oh, she’s sure to, dear.’
    ‘Is it in good taste?’ Caterina queried, having doubts.
    Amelie was careful here. ‘It will depend,’ she said, cautiously, ‘on what their sister’s preferences are, I suppose. If she has a growing family and plenty of visitors, then a large urn will be just the thing.’ And it would go some way, she thought, towards mollifying her resentment at the insensitive, not to say
inhuman
, attitude of the two brothers who, she hoped, would not follow up their introduction with anything more presumptuous.
    But although the purchase of the vastly overpriced and vulgar gift had evened the score for Amelie in one direction, there was yet a more serious one to consider, calling for a return home at a faster pace than their earlier ride into London. There was now no time to lose. ‘Lise, go and tell the footman we’re ready to go home,’ she said.
    The stares of admiration directed at the beautiful coffee-coloured barouche and the Dalmatian running behind were only vaguely heeded on the return journey to Richmond, for the event that concluded their shopping spree weighed heavily on Amelie’s mind, making her realise yet again that, however good it was to be an independent woman, she was still vulnerable without the comforting support of her husband.
    Sir Josiah Chester had been taken from her with a frightening suddenness two years ago, a most unusual two years that left her with few relatives close enough to assist her through the worst months, the problems of inheritance and estate. The only one of their number whose help had been constant and ungrudging was Sir Josiah’s younger brother Stephen, himself a widower with a young family, of whom Caterina was the eldest.
    It had been to thank Stephen for his generous support thatshe had agreed to take Caterina with her when she moved down to Richmond. Had it not been for that debt which she owed him, for his plea, and for Caterina’s motherless state, she would have made the move alone, which had been her first intention. She had no wish to stay in the Derbyshire town of Buxton for, although she